100 Eternal Moments: Aubade
by Taliax
Summary: Platonic Roxas/Xion for set 3 of Raberba girl's "Other Kinds of Love" challenge. Some canon, some AU.
1. Thirteen

**A/N: So, just realized it's RokuShi Day. I didn't plan on doing this set until I did Set 2, and I wasn't sure I was going to do it at all, but I want to kick my muse back into gear and the easiest way for me to do that is with challenges.**

**The name for this set comes from Roxas's and Xion's keyblade with Mystery Gear equipped.**

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_31 - Thirteen_

"I don't get it."

"Yeah, that's stupid."

Axel sighed. "Don't complain to me; I didn't name the Organization."

Roxas and Xion lay back against Axel's bed and pouted. "There are _fourteen _of us," Roxas said for what had to have been the gazillionth time.

"I already told you, it was Organization XIII before either of you joined. Since before _I _joined, actually." Axel reclined against his headboard. It _was _an interesting question, but he wasn't too curious. It was probably just Xemnas's eccentricity. Like his obsession with the letter X.

"It's still stupid," Roxas insisted.

"And I still don't get it. But I guess you're just lucky, Roxas," Xion said, smiling at him. "Number XIII in Organization XIII."

Roxas shrugged. "It's okay, I guess."

Axel looked away and frowned. The two young Nobodies were still too naïve to know that thirteen was the most unlucky number.


	2. Colors

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_32 – Colors_

"I want _this _color," Xion decided, waving a bright purple paint swatch. "Isn't it pretty, Daddy?"

Axel chuckled. "Sure." The color actually make his eyes want to bleed, but he wasn't about to tell her that. Roxas did the job for him, anyway.

"Purple's a stupid color. This color's way better." Roxas shoved a bright, flaming red swatch towards Axel's face, which he plucked from the seven-year-old's fingers.

"I dunno." Axel put the burning red half way on top of the eye-stabbing purple. The combination was enough to actually make his eyes water, regardless of how much he liked red. "Maybe we'll just have to paint two walls one color and two walls the other color."

"No!" Roxas and Xion both exclaimed.

"Then you guys better agree on one color," Axel told them.

The twins glared at each other and crossed their arms. "I don't want to sleep with her," Roxas said.

"I want my own room. I'll paint it Periwinkle Party" –the name of the awful paint color—"and hang all my pony posters on all the walls and Roxas's dragons won't breathe fire all over them."

"And _I'll _have my own room where my dragons can breathe all the fire they want. And I'd drink chocolate milk in bed."

Axel ruffled his son's hair in amusement. "That's not quite how it works, Rox. But it doesn't matter, because you two can't have your own rooms."

Xion sighed. "I know. Our house isn't big enough."

It wasn't even a house, technically. The three of them were sitting on the floor of one of the two bedrooms in their apartment in Twilight Town. With two kids and a job that barely paid above minimum wage, it was a miracle Axel could even afford their humble home.

But it was home. No matter what garish color Roxas and Xion ended up deciding to paint their room.

"You wouldn't want to sleep by yourself, anyway," Axel said. In fact, the kids ended up in his bed more nights than they slept in their own, so he didn't see why picking a color was such a big issue. "You two like each other too much."

Xion and Roxas exchanged a sheepish glance. "…She's my sister. I have to like her," Roxas said.

"Well I'd like you even if I didn't have to," Xion said, smiling a little.

"…Yeah," Roxas agreed and went back to looking at paint swatches, throwing all the ones he didn't like into a pile behind him.

"This one's not so bad." A corner of a cool blue swatch stuck out at the edge of their unsorted pile, which Xion dug out and placed on top. Roxas picked it up thoughtfully.

"Blue's a boy color," he said in approval.

"Guess that settles it, then." Axel smiled, and Roxas handed him the color. "Huh…" Holding it up, he realized it matched the color of his children's eyes exactly. That same deep, clear color, a shade lighter and bluer than the indigo-violet of their mother's.

"What is it, Daddy?" Xion asked.

"We picked the color," Roxas said, like he expected Axel to go back and tell them they couldn't have it.

"Yeah. It's a good color." Axel ruffled the twins' hair and stood up, ignoring the rainbow mess of colored paper squares littered across the carpet. "C'mon, let's go back to the paint store."

"Yay!"

**A/N: I'm redoing my room, and my sister keeps trying to make me paint it the colors she wants, so that's where I got my inspiration from. xP**

**The workers at the paint store must've had a cow when the three of them came in and picked out all the paint swatches. XD I can just see Roxas and Xion grabbing every color and being all like "SHINY!" XD XD**


	3. Vivid

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_33 – Vivid_

I still don't get what it means to be a Nobody. Probably because I don't remember being a Somebody in the first place. What's the difference, anyway? Hearts? What are they? Why do I need one?

"Hi, Roxas." Xion's voice and smile distract me.

"Hey." I grin back.

"That's better," she says.

"Huh?"

"I was worried for a second. You looked like you were trying to have a staring contest with the sun."

"Oh… I was just thinking." I hand her a still-cold ice cream bar, and she sits down.

"Axel says that can make you have the Blinded status condition forever. Staring at the sun I mean, not thinking." She laughs. "So what were you thinking about?"

I sigh, and my warm puff of breath melts the tip of my ice cream. "Life, I guess. I just have so many questions…"

Her black eyebrows come together. "Me too."

We both stay silent for a while, not even eating our ice cream. Sure, we have questions, but none we can help each other answer. Not like we haven't tried.

"Everything seems so real," Xion finally whispers.

"Huh?"

She stares off at the red horizon. "The sunset. Sitting here. Eating ice cream." Taking a bite, she smiles slightly before finishing, "And you."

"Me?" I blink. The sun left those bright spots in my eyes.

"Especially you." She turns towards me with eyes that are a vivid, electric blue. "You were the first thing that was real to me, you know. Nobody or not."

Yeah… I _do _know.

"You're real to me, too," I reply. "Nobody or not, friends are friends."

She laughs. "You're sweet, Roxas."

I look at her in confusion. "You've never tasted me. Right?" That would be weird. I don't think Nobodies would taste sweet, anyway. Probably mostly bitter. Except maybe Demyx with all the candy he eats…

"Huh-? Oh," she laughs, "it's a figure of speech." She looks a little happy to know something I don't.

"Oh." Axel says that 'figure of speech' thing sometimes. I still don't know exactly what it means, but I don't want to look dumb again. "Well, you're sweet too. And salty." That must be a nice thing to call someone, since ice cream's sweet and salty, and what's better than ice cream?

She laughs again, and I almost fall off the ledge when she hugs me. "You're the best, Roxas."

Okay, I can think of one thing.

**A/N: I'm going to be gone for three weeks; this will probably be my last update before then.**


	4. Seam

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_34 – Seam_

"Roxas, _please _tell me you're not going out in that." Thank goodness I stopped my brother before he could leave our dorm room.

"What's wrong with it?" He tugged one of the drawstrings on his favorite hoodie. Said article of clothing had been his favorite for over ten years, and it looked its age. There's a reason I hid it under my bed, but I must have forgotten to shove it back under there after I cleaned my room last night. "'S not like I'm going on a date or anything."

I wanted to laugh at my adorkable little brother. Well, he was only younger than me by thirteen minutes since we're twins, but he acts like he's thirteen years younger. "Did you even look in a mirror this morning?"

"Yeah…" He ran a hand through his messy spikes of hair that he somehow gets away with never brushing. My good hygiene still has yet to rub off on him. "So what's the problem?"

"It's faded so bad it looks pink instead of red, there's an ice cream stain on the back of it, the lettering's peeling off so it says 'Twil t To n' instead of 'Twilight Town,' and the seam is ripped on your right sleeve." I crossed my arms.

"…You can sew that back on, right?"

I tried to cover my laugh with a sigh. "Roxas, you really need to trash that thing. It's disgusting."

"But… Axel gave it to me when he went to college…" Roxas buried his hands in the sagging pocket of the ugly sweatshirt.

That was right, though, I'd forgotten about that. And now our brother Axel was far away with his job and here we were in the same college he went to, but still without him… Okay, maybe I could see why he wanted to keep that stretched-out, too-short old thing.

When I hugged Roxas, I could smell how gross it was. "You still can't go out in it. Someone will think you're homeless."

"But…" He sighed. "I still don't want you to throw it away."

I smiled and ruffled his hair. "Hey, you can still wear it around the dorm. As soon as I fix that seam."


	5. Sandwich

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_35 – Sandwich_

"I've got like a hundred Blizzard panels I never use," Roxas said, handing them over to Xion.

"Thanks, I'll get Gloomex to synthesize some Blizzagas from them. Do you need any potions?"

"No, I've got plenty of those, but I can't get this Lift Gear to fit in my grid…"

Their panel-arranging session was interrupted by a black-and-red figure tumbling out of a dark corridor and onto the Grey Area floor.

"Axel!" The two young Nobodies jumped up at once.

"Urk…"

"Axel, what happened?!" Xion asked.

"Told Saï… gimme a… sick day…"

They lifted him onto a couch as carefully as they could, which wasn't too difficult thanks to his thin frame, which seemed even thinner today. His black coat hung limply from his shoulders, and his facial tattoos stood out darkly against his too pale skin, like cold drops of ink. Roxas gave him a spare potion panel, but even that didn't seem to help.

"Do you have an elixir?" Xion asked him, but he shook his head. "Me neither… what can we do?"

"Food," Axel moaned. "And water…"

"On it!" Roxas and Xion dashed for the kitchen, not wanting to waste any time.

"Are you scared, Roxas?" Xion asked quietly when they reached the kitchen.

"I dunno. Are we allowed to be scared?" Roxas frowned. "What should we feed him? Ice cream?"

Xion shook her head. "He felt strangely cold already… maybe some soup?"

"Good idea. I'll work on that; you go give Axel some water."

She nodded and filled a glass before leaving Roxas in the kitchen alone. It was only then that he realized he had no idea how to make soup.

"How hard can it be?" He dug a big pot out of one of the cabinets. "You just… mix a bunch of stuff together. Yeah."

He lit a burner on the stove with some Fire magic (he remembered when Axel taught him that) and set the pot on top. "It needs some sort of liquid in it…"

Water didn't taste like anything, and the only other drink in the refrigerator was Demyx's chocolate milk, so Roxas poured the brown liquid into the pot.

"Ow!" He yelped when a few hot drops spattered back out, hitting his face. "Next time put the milk in _before _it gets hot. And pour it in slowly."

Next he opened the pantry to find it sadly bare, except for a few boxes of breakfast cereal. Oh, and a couple of old potatoes.

"Well, cereal goes well with milk… and potatoes are… well, I dunno about potatoes…" He dumped both the vegetables and the three different kinds of cereal (Froot Loops, Lucky Charms, and Cocoa Puffs) into the bubbling chocolate milk. He was just getting ready to see what they had in the refrigerator when Xion returned.

"Sorry I took so long, Axel had a little trouble with his water… Apparently he ran into some of those Wonderland Heartless that flip-foot you in addition to his sickness…" Xion's coat was dripping from the sleeves.

"Did he end up drinking any?" It looked like it all ended up on her.

Xion sighed. "NO, I came back to refill the glass." She headed for the sink.

"Oh. Well I'm almost done with the soup… I think."

"You think?" Xion's nose wrinkled. "Wait – Is that-?"

"Uh… yeah… grocery day's tomorrow, so there wasn't a lot to work with…" Roxas's shoulders slumped. "I don't think he'll like it…"

Xion gave her friend a supportive smile. "It's not done yet. It might only smell strange while it's cooking."

"Yeah… maybe."

"I'm sure he'll like it. You're doing great, Roxas."

As Xion left to try again at giving Axel water, Roxas smiled and opened the refrigerator. The sight was disappointing.

"Leftover lasagna? That's it? …Well, it tasted pretty good last night, it might taste good again…" He took a spoon from the silverware drawer and glopped out spoonfulls of the leftovers.

As he stirred the strange-scented soup, he thought about Axel's condition. He'd never seen the flame-wielder look so awful…

"He's not fading, is he?" Roxas worriedly asked Xion when she returned. The grim look on her face told him she'd already thought of this.

"I-I don't know… Axel's strong… but I don't know what he meant when he said he needed a 'sick day.' What does 'sick' mean?"

"I don't know…" Roxas shut his eyes tightly. They couldn't ask Axel, because he was too weak to form complete sentences, but they didn't have time to find anyone else… _Why do I have to be so stupid? If I knew stuff I'd be able to help him… _"I hope this soup makes him feel better."

"I guess that's all we can do." Xion quickly filled a bowl with the sill-not-quite-right soup. "Let's hurry."

Roxas opened a corridor (why hadn't they done that the first time?), and they rushed to Axel's side.

"Axel?"

"Axel!"

He was so _still, _like all the fire had gone out of him. Was this what fading was like? You go still, and then you disappear?

"Xion, feed him! Quick!"

She shook out of her shock and dipped the spoon into the soup, removing it when it was full of chocolate milk and lasagna.

"I hope this works…"

Roxas had to pull Axel's jaw open so Xion could feed him, which was much easier said than done. Unconscious people weren't good at eating. Roxas even had to awkwardly tip his friend's head back to make him swallow, which had mixed results…

"GAK-uckrk-_huuuuurrrrk…" _The chunky bite of soup hurled gracelessly from Axel's mouth onto the floor.

"Yay, he's okay!" Roxas cheered.

"Um, actually, I think he was choking…"

Axel sat up weakly, his arms shaking. "What… exactly… were you trying to feed me?"

"I made soup. It made you better," Roxas said proudly, happy that Axel didn't seem to be fading anymore. The redhead looked down at the disgusting lump he had ejected onto the ground.

"Well… maybe next time you should just try a sandwich."


	6. Glitter

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_36 – Glitter_

There were so many _girls _in his class. The only other boys besides himself were Seifer and his jerk friends that liked to steal his chocolate milk last year. How was Roxas going to make it through one day of first grade, much less a whole year?

"I don't wanna go to school," he said, grabbing his dad's belt loop before he could leave.

The tall man sighed, crouching down to his son's level. "We went through this last year, Rox. You have to go to school 'cause I'm too dumb to homeschool you."

"No you're not. You're the smartest dad in all the worlds," Roxas said seriously. His dad chuckled and ran a hand through his explosion of red hair.

"I'm flattered, but you still have to go to school."

"But… I'm sick." Roxas fake-coughed, holding his stomach pitifully and giving his dad watery blue puppy eyes.

"No," the redhead closed his own green eyes tightly. "That won't work this time, Rox. You were fine enough to eat chocolate chip pancakes this morning, and you're fine enough to go to school."

"But there are too many _girls… _and Seifer…" he mumbled, casting a nervous glance to where his rival was trying and failing to sneak crayons into Fuu's hair.

"Hey, if that punk tries to mess with you, I'll knock him into last week," his dad promised with a grin, whispering so Roxas's teacher, who was talking with another child's parent, wouldn't overhear. "And girls aren't so bad. I'm sure you can make friends with one of them easy with those big blue eyes of yours."

Roxas didn't understand what his eyes had to do with anything, but he still didn't like girls. "They'll wanna dress me up or put stuff on my face just like Naminé does."

His dad couldn't help chuckling at that. "Not all girls are like your cousin. Go on, at least try talking to one."

"No way." Roxas crossed his arms.

"Fine, be a Mister Grumpypants. But Grumpypantses don't get ice cream after school."

"No!"

"Then go find a seat before you get stuck next to Seifer. I've gotta leave or I'll be late for work, and then I'll get chewed out for so long _neither _or us get ice cream." He smiled and ruffled his son's blond hair. "Love you, Rox."

"…Love you too, Dad," Roxas finally replied after de-smushing his hair.

Then his dad, the best person in the worlds, left him alone in a room full of girls and jerks. He had no other choice but to sulk to the open seat farthest away from Seifer, which happened to be next to a black-haired girl trotting a toy pony across the table. Ugh. He was going to catch cooties, and then he really _would _be sick. Maybe she would just ignore him…

"Hi!" She greeted him in a chirpy voice, turning the pony to face him. "You sat by me. You must be nice."

In response to that Roxas scooted his chair away, which only made her lean closer.

"Are you okay?" She asked, sounding like she actually cared for some reason.

"No," he grumbled back.

"What's wrong?"

"I don't wanna go to school."

"Oh." She went back to playing with her pony, but she still talked to him. "I didn't really want to go to school, either."

"Why?" Roxas asked. It wasn't like she had to worry about Seifer or girls.

"We just moved here, so I don't know anyone except Pinkie Pie." She held up her bright pink toy pony. "And now I know you too. What's your name?"

"…Roxas."

"Hi, Roxas. I'm Xion Elaine Knight," she said her full name proudly. "I brought Pinkie Pie to help me make friends, because she's friends with everypony in Ponyville."

"I'm not your friend," Roxas said grumpily. He could practically feel the cooties crawling on his skin. The pony probably had them, too.

Xion blinked. "Why not?"

"Because you're a girl," Roxas replied simply, and Xion's eyebrows furrowed.

"That's dumb. I'm friends with boys."

"Really?" Roxas didn't believe it. Why would any boy be friends with such a girly-girl?

"Yep. Sora and Riku are my friends, but I'm far away from them now." She frowned and hugged her pony.

"…Oh. I don't have any friends here either." But unlike her, he didn't have any friends anywhere, except his dad.

"…Does that mean you want to be friends?" Xion asked.

Roxas frowned. Was having a friend who was a girl better than having no friends? "I guess."

Xion smiled. She was actually kind of pretty when she did that. "Yay! Do you want to be Pinkie Pie's friend, too?"

…Well, as long as none of the boys heard… "Fine."

Xion smiled even brighter. "I knew you just needed some friends. Do you feel better now?"

"…Kind of," he admitted. Xion was sort of weird, but she wasn't mean.

"I know what'll make you feel even better!" She dug in her backpack and pulled out a sparkly golden pegasus. "Her name's Sunshine Glitter. You can play with her."

Roxas stared at the glitter-covered toy pegasus in front of him. It looked like a pony, but it had wings. Wings were cool. Gold was cool, too. But it had big girly eyes, and so much _glitter. _It was flaking off all over the table. He poked it, and the glitter rubbed off on his finger.

A brilliant idea flashed through his head of him rubbing the glitter-covered pegasus all over Seifer's hair. He grinned mischievously.

"What are we going to play?"

Xion grinned back, happy he asked. "Journey to Kingdom Hearts. Sora and Riku made it up. We used to play it with ourselves instead of ponies, but we can't run around in here like we did on the islands," she explained. "So we can play with Pinkie Pie and Sunshine Glitter. They go all over the universe fighting bad guys and trying to find Kingdom Hearts."

Ponies fighting bad guys? Okay, that was kind of cool. Dragons would've been cooler, but still, maybe Xion wasn't as girly as he'd thought.

"Why do we want to find Kingdom Hearts?" Roxas asked.

"Because it's filled with love and happiness, so no one would ever be mean ever again."

So maybe she was as girly as he'd thought. Oh well, at least he had someone to play with and a pony to rub in Seifer's hair later.

"Okay. Let's go fight bad guys."

They didn't have long to play before their teacher started class, but they agreed to continue their game at recess. Roxas was surprised at how sad he was to put Sunshine Glitter back in Xion's backpack.

Maybe his dad would let her come eat ice cream with them.


	7. Makeup

_xX~100 Eternal Moments~Xx_

_Set 3 – Aubade_

_37 – Makeup_

Xion gasped upon entering Roxas's room.

"No! Shoo! Go away!" Flailing her arms like she was trying to scatter a flock of birds, she chased off the Dusks that were hovering around Roxas's bed. They disappeared with disappointed hisses. "Why can't you just leave him alone…?"

She had been prepared for this, though. She stood at her unconscious friend's bedside and pulled a damp cloth out of her pocket. "At least you won't remember them doing this to you…"

Humming a soft melody, she carefully wiped away the bright makeup the Dusks had applied to her friend's face. Slowly Roxas's original features appeared from under the mask of purple, blue, and red doodles of hearts and Nobody emblems.

"Much better." Xion smiled when all the makeup had been transferred from Roxas's face to the cloth. "I brought another present for you."

"_Is it another seashell?" _She imagined he would ask, if he could.

"Actually, it's something different today." Her pocket was deep, and it took a while to find what she was looking for, but eventually she dug out an orange-tinted glass shard rimmed in gold metal. The shape resembled a thassala shell, Xion's favorite.

"I found this washed up on the beach today," she said, placing the small treasure on Roxas's pillow, adding it to the collection of colorful seashells. "It looks kind of like a shell, but it isn't. I don't actually know what it is," she admitted. It had caught her attention by catching the last rays of sunset, setting it ablaze with red, orange, and gold light.

"I don't know why, but it feels special somehow. Maybe you can help me figure out why when you wake up."

He didn't reply, of course. Part of her had expected him to in spite of his comatose state, but her hope faded as the silence stretched on. She sighed.

"I just hope you wake up soon…"


End file.
